Bill Clinton stumps for Harris, Rosen ahead of Nov. 5 election

Former President Bill Clinton outlined why Vice President Kamala Harris would be better for Nevada during a Tuesday event in the Historic Westside, where he encouraged supporters to knock on doors in the final stretch of the Nov. 5 election to engage with voters.

“We can run away with this thing still, but we got to care enough to show up. We got to care enough to talk to our neighbors,” he told a crowd of over 200 at the Doolittle Community Center.

Clinton highlighted accomplishments under the Biden-Harris administration and Harris’ plans for the economy and immigration, key issues important to voters in Nevada, where Harris and Trump are neck-in-neck, polls show.

The former president said Trump inherited a good economy from former President Barack Obama, and after COVID, the economy took the Biden administration time to rebuild. He highlighted the administration’s job growth, saying it will have produced “the largest number of jobs in four years.”

Clinton listed bills passed under the Biden-Harris administration, from the CHIPS Act, which he said revolutionized manufacturing, to the Inflation Reduction Act, which lowered the costs of insulin for people on Medicare. He said thanks to the infrastructure bill, the country is best positioned for the 21st century.

People have the right to be upset about inflation in food prices, he said. Every major country in the world has had inflation due to COVID and a break-down of the supply chain, he said. Inflation is tailing off, he said, but costs are still higher. Harris wants to crack down on price gouging and ask the justice department to investigate companies, he said.

“If the issue is health care, or the issue is infrastructure or the issue is food prices, it’s not close,” Clinton said, adding that gas prices are going down.

Anna Kelly, a spokesperson for the RNC, said Clinton should tell Harris to stop pushing policies that have driven up prices for groceries, child care and housing, “making it unaffordable for Americans to have children.”

Clinton also said Nevada got hit by a housing crisis because it was hit by the crash. People left Las Vegas, and when people wanted to come back, big corporations had bought up housing, Clinton said. Harris proposed increasing affordable housing and helping people on down payments.

“This is really significant, and nobody talks about it ‘cuz you turn on the news every night … and you just want to see which side called the other a more clever name,” he said.

He also provided context to the influx of immigration, saying that upheavals across the world have produced the largest number of immigrants since World War II. Biden and Harris offered a plan that addressed both the number of people who could enter the country as well as the number of judges and advocates to help people get citizenship, Clinton said. Republicans got behind the legislation before it was blocked by Trump, he said.

“This country cannot do what it needs to do if we’re more interested in division and subtraction than addition and multiplication,” Clinton said.

Clinton also campaigned for Sen. Jacky Rosen, who is up for re-election in November. He highlighted her bipartisan record and said about 90 percent of the bills she introduced had a Republican co-sponsor. He also said her efforts to pass the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law alone is enough to justify her re-election.

“I think Jacky Rosen is an extraordinary senator,” Clinton said.

The former president wrapped up by encouraging people to go out and knock on doors, highlighting the important role Nevada will have.

“It’s going to be hard for us to win if we don’t carry here,” he said. “We certainly can’t hold the Senate if we don’t carry here.”